Hi,

We have a problem with deadlines every year roughly between June and September; dont ask me why but when the good weather comes people start buying windows like maniacs Our approach has been giving a 15 to 20 business days deadline but we can only deliver the product within 30 sometimes 35 business days.

My concern is that these 1st time buyers may get a wrong impression about us since its hard for us to hire 2 or 3 new employees just for these months; we have a hiring policy where when we hire someone we will not get rid of that person soon (unless that person cant really fit in this type of industry obviously). Remember if we give people the real deadline (30 to 35 business days) kinda likely other companies will give the 15 to 20 days deadline and we loose that sale.

Right now we are phone calling people telling them their product is still in manufacturing so they will have to expect a few extra days; this is smoothing a little bit their anger if ya know what i mean, even tho id like to know if anyone out there has an idea to smooth this even more.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Do your competitors have a similar "real" deadline?

If so, you might want to bring that to the customers attention. I find it is always best to under promise and over deliver.

In addition to calling attention to the "real" deadline, I would point out other competitive advantages that you offer at the time of sale. If you promise a realistic delivery date, and do this, you will have less anger to sort out from the customers.

I know exactly what you mean. We have one client who is outsourcing about fours jobs to us and I have no idea what he is thinking that we can actually give him everything in just a couple of weeks.

But communication is the key - call them. Let them know that is is taking a bit longer. They will appreciate (usually) for the direct communication between you and them.

You could set your standard delivery time to 30 days and then beat that expectation 9 months of the year. How about hiring seasonal employees? A lot of businesses do that.

The seasonal employees is an idea wich was advanced by me already quite sometime ago; problem is my partner really wants to stick to the actual hiring policy and i cant do more to explain him the benefits of seasonal personnel. Issue about seting 30 business days to delivery is to loose potential sales. Competitors give also surreal delivery dates and then get delayed like everyone else, im just tryin to figure out a way to be a step forward ya know. Anyway, thanks all for your advises, they were a good help.

Would it be possible for you to increase your on stock supply of your most popular windows, to cover the expected increase in sales during those months, or do you manufacture them as the orders come in?

You might also consider posting a notice for your customers, informing them in advance that purchases made during this time period may result in longer than normal processing times, as a result of an expected increase in sales during this time period?

You might even consider offering your customers a discount on their next purchase, should the delivery of their current order take longer than expected for delivery?

Any advance notice made available to the customers regarding possible delays during this time period, should help to reduce the potential for a dissatisfied customer.

I would begin advertising in December (could be an outrageous ad, too) and educate your customers about the season and preparing in advance to minimize lead time.

Keep up the campaign in February, or monthly.

Have an offer if they preorder before the spring thaw at a 10% discount, or some other incentive that gets them lined up sooner.

I did an ad campaign for a Florida realtor who specializes in selling to people in the NE states. The front of their marketing materials has a Florida beach on the right, and a guy with his snowblower in a blizzard on the left. The pitch is "How do you get from here to there?" He sends postcards in July and they are fairly persuasive for the fence straddlers who are not yet convinced to make the move.

Preselling is the key in both situations. Good luck.